Electronic devices such as communications units or subscriber devices providing data and voice services for user operating in corresponding systems are known. Operating these devices or units by interacting with a keypad or keyboard and display can be challenging when the user is otherwise preoccupied. It is known to include voice recognition systems to assist with controlling these devices for some purposes, however voice recognition systems are often marginal, suffer in high ambient noise environments, and can be a burden if the recognition system needs to be trained.
Controlling electronic devices or communications units from applications, for example, has been contemplated but such control has been limited to APIs (application program interfaces) where the interface details are defined according to the API. It is known to download software including applications to communication units as well as to configure the units. With these approaches there is a security risk and thus only highly trusted sources can have access to the unit. Clearly a need exists for methods and apparatus for securely providing assistance to a communications unit and preferably this assistance would be widely available over for example a network.